In an exemplary manner, one may consider a product, for instance, a tampon. Generally, a tampon is a piece of fibrous material that is shaped to be insertable into a body cavity, such as, for example, a vagina or a nasal cavity. According to certain embodiments, the tampon is disposed in a tube-shaped applicator prior to use, although an applicator need not be included in all applications. Typically, the user positions the tampon in the appropriate body cavity, and then disposes of the applicator, if used.
Despite the fact that tampons have been in use for years, advancements in the materials and the processes used to make tampons have generally come about as a consequence of experimental “trial and error.” That is, to the extent that one may believe that a new material or a variation in a process condition may lead to a superior tampon product, the conventional method has been to fabricate a tampon using the new material or process step, and then subject the tampon thus fabricated to testing. The testing typically has been qualitative in nature, and success or failure may be based on little more than the volume of liquid absorbed. If testing does not bear out initial optimism, then the designer would start the process anew with a different material or process variation.
Even if testing suggests that the tampon made using the new material or the new process may be superior to past tampons, not every such improvement necessarily results in a commercially feasible product. A design considered successful under laboratory conditions might prove difficult or expensive to fabricate under actual processing conditions or when manufactured using conventional fabrication equipment. Therefore, even if the design showed positive performance under test conditions, the designer might have to start over from scratch after field trials are performed.
This type of iterative design process is expensive in terms of money, material and time.
Accordingly, it would be desirable to provide a system or a method that simulates behavior of the fibrous material that is made into a tampon. It would be desirable to provide a system or a method that simulates behavior of fibrous material that is made into a tampon by way of a computer model. In a more general sense, it would be desirable to have a method and system for modeling materials that are made into a variety of products, of which the tampon is but one product. It would also be desirable to provide a system or a method that provides values that could be used to determine the process characteristics that would provide a given measurement in the finished product, or determine the measurements in the finished product for a change in a process characteristic.